e- 


UKRAINE  AND  THE 


UKRAINIANS 


A  Handbook  of  Concise  Information  Regarding  the 

Country,  People,  History  and 
Industry  of  Ukraine 


\ 


By 


EMIL  REVYUK 


1920 

WASHINGTON,  D.  C 


Revyuk ,  .trail 

Ukraine  and.  the  Ukrainians;  a 
handbook  of  oonoise  information  re¬ 
garding  the  country,  people,  history 
and  industry  of  Ukraine.  1920. 


UKRAINE  AND  THE 
UKRAINIANS 


A  Handbook  of  Concise  Information  Regarding  the  Country, 
People,  History  and  Industry  of  Ukraine 


By 

EMIL  REVYUK 


1920 

PUBLISHED  BY 

FRIENDS  OF  UKRAINE 
345  MUNSEY  BUILDING 
WASHINGTON,  D.  C. 


OTHER  PAMPHLETS  PUBLISHED 

BY 

THE  FRIENDS  OF  UKRAINE 


1 .  Bolshevism  and  Ukraine.  Two  cents. 

2.  Ukraine,  Poland  and  Russia  and  the  Right  of  the 

Free  Disposition  of  Peoples.  By  S.  Shelukhin. 
Ten  cents. 

3.  Protest  of  the  Ukrainian  Republic  to  the  United 

States  Against  the  Delivery  of  Eastern  Galicia 
to  Polish  Domination.  Ten  cents. 

4.  The  Jewish  Pogroms  in  Ukraine.  By  Julian  Batchin- 

sky,  Israel  Zangwill  and  others.  Ten  cents. 

3.  Ukraine  and  Russia.  By  Woldemar  Timoshenko, 
Vice  Director  of  the  Economic  Institute  at  the 
Academy  of  Sciences  of  Ukraine.  Ten  cents. 

6.  What  About  Ukraine?  Editorials  of  Times- Picayune, 

N.  Y.  Times  and  N.  Y.  Tribune.  Five  cents. 

7.  Trade  With  Ukraine.  Ukraine’s  Natural  Wealth, 

Needs  and  Commercial  Opportunities:  The 
Ukrainian  Co-operative  Societies  and  Their  In¬ 
fluence.  By  Emil  Revyuk.  Ten  cents. 

8.  Inhuman  Blockade  Strangling  a  Nation.  Letters 

and  Messages  from  Stricken  Ukraine.  Ten  cents. 


Address  all  communications  to 

FRIENDS  OF  UKRAINE 

345  Munsey  Building  ::  ::  ::  Washington,  D.  C. 


Ukraine  and  the  Ukrainians 


I.  THE  COUNTRY 

1.  WHAT  IS  UKRAINE? 

Ukraine  is  the  country  populated  by  a  compact  mass  of 
the  Ukrainians:  that  territory  in  which  the  Ukrainians 
constitute  the  majority  of  the  population. 

2.  UKRAINE’S  SITUATION. 

Ukraine  occupies  the  southern  part  of  Eastern  Europe, 
and  constitutes  the  hinterland  of  the  Black  Sea.  It 
stretches,  roughly  speaking,  from  the  river  San  in  the 
west  to  the  river  Don  in  the  east,  and  from  the  river  Pripet 
in  the  north  to  the  Black  Sea  in  the  south. 

3.  UKRAINE’S  NEIGHBORS. 

Ukraine  borders  in  the  southwest  on  the  masses  of  the 
Roumanians  and  Magyars ;  in  the  west  on  the  ethno¬ 
graphic  territories  of  the  Slovaks  and  Poles;  in  the  north 
on  the  White  Ruthenians  and  Great  Russians;  in  the  east 
on  the  Great  Russians  and  one  of  the  smaller  Mongolian 
tribes ;  in  the  south  on  the  Crimean  Tartars. 

4.  UKRAINE’S  POLITICAL  SUBDIVISIONS  BEFORE 

THE  WAR. 

Before  the  World  War,  the  Ukrainians  were  split  up 
politically  between  the  empires  of  Austria-Hungary  and 
Russia. 

They  occupy,  in  what  was  Austria-Hungary,  the  south¬ 
western  part  of  Western  Galicia,  the  whole  of  Eastern 
Galicia ;  the  northern  and  the  northwestern  part  of  the 
province  of  Bukovina ;  and  the  northeastern  portion  of 
Hungary,  on  the  slopes  of  the  Carpathians,  where  they 
were  known  as  Uhro-Rusins  (Uhro-Rusinia). 

In  the  former  Russian  empire,  the  Ukrainians  inhabit 
the  province  of  Kholm;  the  southern  parts  of  the  prov- 


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inces  of  Grodno  and  Minsk ;  the  southern  districts  of  the 
provinces  of  Kursk  and  Voronezh;  the  entire  provinces 
of  Volhynia,  Podolia,  Chernihiv,  Kiev,  Poltava,  Kharkov, 
Katerinoslav,  Kherson  and  Tauria ;  the  northern  and  south¬ 
eastern  districts  of  the  province  of  Bessarabia ;  the  western 
part  of  the  province  of  the  Don  Cossacks ;  the  entire 
province  of  the  Kuban  Cossacks ;  the  southern  portions  of 
the  province  of  Stavropol;  the  northern  portion  of  the 
Terek  region;  and  the  northern  part  of  the  Black  Sea 
province. 

5.  UKRAINE’S  TOTAL  AREA. 

Ukraine’s  total  area  amounts  to  about  330,000  square 
miles,  of  which  300,000  were  included  in  former  Russia 
and  30,000  in  former  Austria-Hungary.  This  is  approxi¬ 
mately  the  same  as  the  area  of  New  England  together  with 
all  of  the  Atlantic  seaboard  as  far  south  as  Georgia. 

6.  UKRAINE’S  TOPOGRAPHY. 

Across  the  southwestern  corner  of  the  Ukrainian  terri¬ 
tory  pass  the  ridges  of  the  Carpathians,  while  in  Crimea 
Ukraine  touches  the  Yaila  Mountains,  and  in  the  Kuban 
region  the  Caucasus.  Outside  of  this,  the  land  is  flat.  In 
the  central  and  eastern  portions  are  the  famous  plateaus 
known  as  the  steppes.  The  rare  charm  of  the  Ukrainian 
landscape  has  had  a  profound  effect  upon  the  minds  and 
life  of  the  people. 

The  principal  rivers  drain  toward  the  Black  Sea.  These 
are :  the  Dnieper ;  the  Dniester ;  the  Bug ;  the  Pruth  (which 
flows  into  the  Danube)  ;  the  Don,  with  the  Donetz  (which 
empties  into  the  Sea  of  Azov),  and  the  Kuban.  The  only 
stream  of  size  included  in  another  drainage-area  is  the 
river  San  (in  Central  Galicia),  a  tributary  of  the  Vistula. 

7.  UKRAINE’S  CLIMATE. 

The  climate  is  classed  as  temperate  and  salubrious, 
though  it  shows  considerable  seasonal  variations.  The 
winters  are  often  severe,  while  the  summers  are  verv 
hot.  There  is  a  relatively  slight  precipitation.  The  cold 
weather  is  considerably  milder  than  that  of  Great  Russia. 


5 


8.  UKRAINE’S  SOIL  AND  MINERALS. 

Almost  three-fourths  of  Ukraine  lies  within  the  East¬ 
ern  European  black-earth  zone,  the  most  fertile  soil  on 
the  globe. 

Ukraine  is  rich  in  mineral  resources.  She  possesses  in 
abundance  coal,  iron,  salt,  and  petroleum. 

9.  UKRAINE’S  PLANT  AND  ANIMAL  LIFE. 

The  forest  region  occupies  barely  one-eighth  of  Ukraine, 
chiefly  in  the  northwest  and  in  the  border  lands  of  the 
north.  The  remainder  is  steppe,  with  a  flora  and  fauna 
typical  of  the  Eastern  European  lands,  but  characterized 
by  somewhat  greater  variety. 


6 


II.  THE  PEOPLE 

1.  UKRAINE’S  POPULATION. 

The  population  of  Ukraine  is  estimated  at  45,000,000.  The 
Polish  scholar,  Mr.  Leon  Wasileski  estimates  that  at  least 
35,000,000  of  these  were  Ukrainians. 

Among  the  Ukrainians  there  are  scattered  colonies  of 
other  nationalities.  In  Eastern  Galicia  the  land-owning 
nobles  and  the  bureaucrats  are  Poles.  In  the  towns  of 
Eastern  Galicia,  the  Jews  predominate.  In  Uhro-Rusinia, 
the  bureaucracy  and  aristocracy  were  Magyars.  In 
the  part  of  Ukraine  formerly  under  Russian  control,  the 
Russians  constituted  the  bulk  of  officialdom.  On  the  right 
bank  of  the  Dnieper,  the  nobility  were  mostly  Polish ;  on 
the  left  bank  they  were  chiefly  Russian.  Most  of  the 
Jews  in  Ukraine  live  west  of  the  Dnieper.  There  are  be¬ 
sides  scattered  colonies  of  Tatars,  Greeks,  Bulgarians, 
Roumanians,  and  others.  These  non-Ukrainian  nationali¬ 
ties  living  in  Ukraine  number  about  12  millions. 

2.  EMIGRATION  FROM  UKRAINE. 

Outside  of  Ukraine  millions  of  Ukrainian  people  are 
living  in  colonies  in  various  parts  of  European  Russia 
(Astrakhan,  Samara,  Saratov,  Orenburg)  and  in  Asia 
(Turkestan  and  Siberia).  Although  the  Ukrainian  immi¬ 
gration  to  America  is  of  comparatively  recent  date  and 
comes  mostly  from  the  western  provinces  of  Ukraine, 
there  are  already  more  than  500,000  persons  of  Ukrainian 
extraction  in  the  United  States.  These  figures  are  some¬ 
what  conjectural,  for  the  immigration  reports  have  classi¬ 
fied  Ukrainians  frequently  as  Russians  or  Poles.  The 
Ukrainians  in  this  country  are  for  the  most  part  employed 
as  miners  and  steel  workers  in  Pennsylvania,  as  factory 
laborers  in  the  New  England  and  Middle  Atlantic  States, 
and  as  farmers  in  the  middle  west.  There  are  about  200,- 
000  Ukrainian  immigrants  in  Canada,  and  over  50,000  in 
Brazil. 

3.  PHYSICAL  ASPECTS. 

Anthropologists  regard  the  Ukrainians  as  typical  Slavs. 
The  respects  in  which  they  differ  from  some  of  the  other 
branches  of  the  Slavic  family  are  described  by  the  Rus¬ 
sian  Encyclopedia  (Petrograd,  1896)  as  follows: 

‘  1  Physically,  the  Ukrainians  differ  from  the  Russians 
and  the  White  Ruthenians  of  Central  Russia  first  of  all  by 


7 


their  stature,  which  on  the  average  is  1  to  4  centimeters 
higher,  according  to  the  official  military  census  of  the 
Russian  Empire,  1874-1883.  ...  A  populace  of  small 

stature  nowhere  occupies  large  stretches  in  Ukraine. 
Further  characteristics  are  a  large  percentage  of  persons 
with  dark  hair,  dark  eyes  and  with  complexions  darker 
than  is  usual  among  the  White  Ruthenians,  Russians,  and 
especially  the  Poles ;  they  also  have  somewhat  longer  legs. 
The  head,  both  absolutely  and  as  compared  with  the  size 
of  the  body,  is  not  large;  this  is  true  also  of  the  cranial 
capacity.  The  nose  and  forehead  are  not  large,  while  the 
lower  third  of  the  face  has  comparatively  larger  dimen¬ 
sions.  As  to  the  form,  the  short  and  broad  head  (brachy- 
cephalic)  predominates  among  the  Ukrainians  to  a  much 
greater  degree  than  among  the  Poles  or  Russians.  High 
cheekbones  and  a  wide  space  between  the  eyes  are  also 
characteristic.’  ’ 

4.  SOCIAL  AND  MORAL  ASPECTS. 

The  Ukrainian  social  and  moral  life  is  distinctive.  The 
Ukrainian  community,  called  “hromada”  has  no  economic 
functions,  as  is  the  case  with  the  Russian  community  or 
“mir.  ”  The  Ukrainian  is  a  convinced  individualist,  as 
opposed  to  the  communistic  Russian.  The  same  individu¬ 
alism  characterizes  the  Ukrainian  family  life,  in  which  the 
woman  occupies  a  position  very  much  more  independent 
than  that  of  the  Russian  woman.  Even  in  appearance,  the 
Ukrainian  settlements  are  unlike  those  of  Russia  or  Po¬ 
land;  it  is  possible  to  tell  the  nationality  of  a  village  at 
the  very  first  glance. 

5.  RELIGIOUS  ASPECTS. 

The  bulk  of  the  Ukrainians  belong  to  the  E  aster n 
Orthodox  Church,  to  the  so-called  Shtunda  or  to  the  Greek 
Catholic  Church.  The  Shtundists  are  a  variety  of  Baptists. 
The  Greek  Catholic  Church,  which  is  strongest  in  East¬ 
ern  Galicia  and  among  the  Uhro-Rusins,  is  Roman  Catho¬ 
lic  in  her  dogma  and  allegiance,  but  Orthodox  in  her  rites. 
Since  the  revolution,  the  Orthodox  Ukrainians  have  organ¬ 
ized  independently  of  the  Orthodox  Russians. 

6.  UKRAINIAN  LANGUAGE. 

The  Ukrainian  language  is  Slavic,  like  that  of  the 
Czechs,  Poles,  Russians  and  Serbs.  From  earliest  times,  it 
has  preserved  its  status  as  a  separate  and  independent 
tongue.  It  has  been  in  literary  use  for  about  one  thousand 


8 


years,  though  it  was  used  first  in  an  archaic  form.  Its  chief 
characteristic  is  its  musical  quality. 

7.  UKRAINIAN  CULTURE. 

In  the  opinion  of  Professor  F.  Bujak,  the  Polish  econo¬ 
mist,  the  Ukrainian  popular  culture  is  richer,  more  homo¬ 
geneous,  and  better  crystallized  than  that  of  the  Poles.  In 
his  opinion,  which  is  supported  by  other  scholars,  the 
Ukrainians  and  Serbs  are  the  most  gifted  artistically  of  the 
Slavic  family.  A  Ukrainian  household  can  be  distinguished 
from  a  Polish  or  Russian  home  by  the  pains  with 
which  the  Ukrainian  cultivates  flowers  around  it.  His 
costume  is  ornamented  with  rich  embrodiery.  The  pottery 
work  done  in  the  central  Ukrainian  provinces  is  famous 
for  its  opulence  of  design  and  fineness  of  execution. 
Equally  famous  are  the  woodcarvings  of  the  Ukrainian 
mountaineers  in  the  Carpathians.  The  idealistic  concep¬ 
tion  of  life  entertained  by  the  Ukrainian,  who  inclines  to 
peaceful  enjoyment  rather  than  the  strenuous  expansion  of 
vital  forces,  testifies  to  the  great  age  of  Ukrainian  popular 
culture. 

8.  UKRAINIAN  FOLK  LITERATURE. 

The  fullest  expression  of  the  spirit  of  Ukraine  is  to  be 
found  in  her  folk  literature.  “The  song  is  the  diary  into 
which  the  Ukrainian  enters  everything  he  feels,  thinks  or 
does.”  The  unwritten  literature  has  preserved  to  us  a 
record  of  the  entire  cultural  evolution  of  the  people,  from 
the  pre-Christian  era  to  the  present  day.  It  has  reflected 
the  life  of  every  class :  the  prince  and  his  suite,  the  Cossack, 
the  “Chumak”  (caravan  merchant),  the  peasant,  the  re¬ 
cruit  ;  each  has  a  cycle  of  his  own,  expressive  of  his  sor¬ 
rows,  joys,  and  struggles.  Reclus,  the  famous  French  geog¬ 
rapher,  in  his  Universal  Geography,  praises  the  Ukrainian 
Cossack  songs  for  their  love  of  freedom;  the  Ukrainian 
ballads  for  their  breadth  of  thought,  strength  of  language, 
and  wealth  of  details ;  the  love  songs  for  their  sweetness 
and  vigor,  combined  with  warmth  and  delicacy.  He  em¬ 
phasizes,  too,  in  their  chronicle-songs  the  spirit  of  anger 
and  revenge  toward  the  oppressors.  He  concludes:  “The 
national  poetry  of  few  languages  excels  that  of  the  Ukrain¬ 
ians  in  energy  of  expression  and  depth  of  feeling.” 

10.  UKRAINIAN  WRITTEN  LITERATURE. 

The  ever  growing  parallelism  between  the  folk  liter¬ 
ature  and  the  written  literature  of  Ukraine  is  the  chief 
characteristic  of  the  nation’s  literary  history. 


9 


The  ancient  period,  corresponding  to  the  era  of  politi¬ 
cal  independence  of  the  country,  produced  chronicle-songs 
and  the  famous  heroic  poem,  “The  Song  of  Ihor’s  Cam¬ 
paign,”  the  oldest  monument  of  belles  lettres  in  any 
Slavonic  language.  This  piece  dates  from  the  twelfth 
century.  It  was  written  in  a  mixture  of  Ukrainian  with 
the  so-called  Church-Slavonic. 

The  middle  period,  which  is  chronologically  identical 
with  the  period  of  political  dependence,  first  upon  Lithu¬ 
ania,  then  Poland,  and  finally  Russia,  was  prolific  only  in 
religious  literature,  especially  the  polemic  works  that 
came  into  being  because  of  the  religious  strife  between 
the  Orthodox  and  the  Catholic  churches.  From  this  per¬ 
iod,  too,  date  the  first  extant  efforts  to  use  in  writing  the 
pure  Ukrainian  idiom  of  the  people,  e.  g.,  the  Bible  of 
Peresop,  written  in  the  sixteenth  century. 

About  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century,  popular  liter¬ 
ature  finally  merged  with  the  written  literature,  and  the 
modern  period  began.  The  foundations  were  laid  for  a 
genuine  revival  of  Ukrainian  letters,  based  upon  the  pure 
Ukrainian  vernacular,  and  secular  in  character.  Ivan 
Kotliarevsky ’s  Travesty  of  the  Aeneid  (1798)  is  usually 
considered  the  starting  point  of  modern  Ukrainian  litera¬ 
ture.  Its  form  is  classic,  but  it  is  written  in  a  romantic 
mood.  This  generation  produced,  beside  Kotliarevsky, 
who  was  both  poet  and  playwright :  the  satirist  Petro 
Artemovsky-Hulak ;  the  poet  E.  Hrebinka ;  the  novelist 
H.  Kvitka,  who  wrote  stories  of  peasant  life.  The  next 
generation  produced  Ukraine’s  greatest  poet,  Taras 
Shevchenko,  and  a  number  of  prominent  writers :  the  poet 
P.  Kulish,  who  translated  the  Bible  and  Shakespeare;  the 
poet  S.  Rudansky;  the  fabulist  L.  Illibiv;  and  novelists 
and  short-story  writers  like  0.  Storozhenko  and  Mrs. 
Marko  Vovchok.  Because  of  the  hostile  attitude  of  the 
Russian  government  toward  the  development  of  Ukrain¬ 
ian  literature,  there  sprang  up  in  Austria  a  school  of 
Ukrainian  writers  rather  larger  and  more  prolific  than 
might  have  been  expected,  in  view  of  the  size  of  the  Ruth- 
enian  population  in  Eastern  Galicia.  There  were  poets 
like  0.  Fedkovich  and  B.  Lepky,  and  short-story  writers 
like  S.  Kovaliv,  Y.  Stefanik,  L.  Martovich  and  I.  Seman- 
yuk.  But  the  greatest  genius  among  them  was  Ivan 
Franko  (1856-1916),  the  distinguished  creator  of  realism 
in  Ukrainian  letters.  Franko  was  not  merely  poet,  short- 
storv  writer  and  novelist,  but  was  a  scholar  as  well. 

Ukrainian  literature  in  former  Russia  also  continued  to 
develop  in  spite  of  the  severe  restrictions  placed  upon  it, 


12 


and  the  more  recent  years  have  given  us :  the  novelist  I.  N. 
Levitsky;  the  short-story  writers  P.  Mirny,  M.  Kotsyubin¬ 
sky,  and  V.  Vinnichenko;  the  poets  V.  Samiylenko,  Lesya 
Ukrainka  (the  pen-name  of  Mrs.  Larissa  Kosach),  0.  Oles, 
and  A.  Krimsky;  and  the  playwrights  M.  Staritsky,  M. 
Kropivnitsky,  I.  Tobilevich,  Lesya  Ukrainka  and  V.  Vin¬ 
nichenko. 

Particularly  in  modern  times,  the  Russian  authorities 
deliberately  persecuted  the  Ukrainian  writers,  and  ob¬ 
liged  them  to  accomplish  that  which  they  could  in  the 
face  of  official  threats.  In  1876,  the  Czar  issued  his  ukase 
forbidding  the  publication  of  works  written  in  Ukrainian, 
with  a  few  exceptions.  The  field  of  literary  endeavor  was 
therefore  shifted  to  Eastern  Galicia,  but  here  too  the 
enmity  of  the  ruling  class  had  to  be  combated.  In  Hun¬ 
gary,  the  Magyars  did  their  best  to  deprive  the  Uhro-Rus- 
ins  of  any  cultural  expression. 

11.  OTHER  CULTURAL  ACHIEVEMENTS. 

A  number  of  important  personages  whom  the  outside 
world  regards  as  Russians  have  in  reality  been  Ukrainians. 
N.  Gogol,  called  “the  creator  of  Russian  prose,”  though 
he  wrote  in  Russian,  was  a  Ukrainian  by  race,  and  so  was 
V.  Korolenko,  one  of  the  foremost  writers  of  contemporary 
Russia.  The  Ukrainian  sociolgist  Michael  Drahomanov 
has  been  called  by  Professor  P.  Struve  “the  first  real  lib¬ 
eral  in  Russia.”  Michael  Tuhan-Baranovsky,  whose  writ¬ 
ings  on  economics  have  been  translated  into  many  lan¬ 
guages,  was  considered  abroad  as  the  foremost  economist  of 
Russia.  Others  who,  because  of  the  restrictions  imposed 
by  the  Russian  government  on  the  Ukrainian  language, 
found  it  expedient  to  write  in  Russian,  were  the  great 
philologist  P.  Potebnya  and  the  sociologist  Maxim  Kova¬ 
levsky.  The  scientific  labors  of  “The  Scientific  Society  of 
Taras  Shevchenko”  in  Lemberg,  have  gained  world-wide 
recognition  for  Ukrainian  scholarship,  especially  in  the 
realms  of  ethnography,  philology  and  history. 

In  art,  Ukraine  gave  to  the  world  Taras  Shevchenko, 
also  a  great  poet,  who  was  the  first  etcher  in  Russia, 
Vassilkovsky ,  and  I.  Trush.  In  music  the  list  includes  N. 
Lissenko,  I.  Bortnyansky,  N.  Stretsenko,  and  S.  Ludke- 
vich.  The  roll  of  statesmen  and  military  leaders  contains 
such  names  as  P.  Konashevich,  B.  Khmelnitsky,  who  led 
the  great  Ukrainian  uprising  against  Poland,  in  the  time 
of  Cromwell,  I.  Vihovsky,  I.  Orlik  and  I.  Mazeppa. 


■ 


13 


III.  HISTORY 


1.  BEGINNINGS. 

The  Ukrainians  have  inhabited  their  homeland  since 
the  dawn  of  history.  In  the  ninth  century,  Kiev  was  the 
capital  of  a  Ukrainian  state  which  also  organized  the 
Russians  and  the  White  Ruthenians  into  a  federative 
union.  The  power  of  this  government  commanded  the 
respect  of  Byzantium,  Bulgaria,  Poland  and  the  Asiatic 
Nomads  in  the  east  and  south.  Its  splendor  was  the  ob¬ 
ject  of  admiration  of  West  European,  Greek  and  Arabian 
merchants.  It  had  gained  a  paramount  commercial  im¬ 
portance  such  that  Poland,  as  a  Polish  historian  observes,, 
was  merely  regarded  by  the  West  Europeans  as  the  pas¬ 
sage  to  Kiev.  Its  culture,  in  which  local  elements  com¬ 
bined  with  the  influences  of  Constantinople,  the  Orient 
and  the  South  Slavs,  produced  admirable  monuments  in 
literature,  religious  and  secular,  in  architecture,  and  in 
education. 

2.  THE  INVASIONS. 

But  Ukraine  lay  on  the  threshold  of  Europe,  through 
which  the  migratory  tribes  of  Asia  now  began  to  sweep^ 
and  was  therefore  obliged  to  bear  the  brunt  of  contin¬ 
uous  invasions.  Straining  her  resistance  to  the  utmost, 
she  contended  successfully  with  Magyars,  Khazars,  Pecli- 
enihi  and  Polovtses.  Then,  in  the  thirteenth  century,  she 
broke  down  defending  herself  against  the  most  terrible  of 
all  invaders,  the  Tartar  Khans.  The  weakened  remnants 
of  Northern  Ukraine  were  united  with  Lithuania.  Only  the 
western  principalities  preserved  their  independence,  such 
as  the  province  (then  the  kingdom)  of  Galicia. 

About  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century,  Galicia 
was  forcibly  occupied  by  Polish  kings.  About  the  end  oL 
that  century,  Lithuania  entered  into  a  union  with  Poland, 
bringing  other  Ukrainian  lands  under  Polish  dominion. 
Ever  since  that  period  the  Ukrainians  have  suffered 
religious,  national  and  social  oppression  at  the  hands, 
of  the  Polish  rulers. 

3.  UNION  WITH  RUSSIA. 

After  a  series  of  uprisings,  the  Ukrainians  succeeded, 
in  1648,  in  liberating  the  central  part  of  Ukraine  from  the 


14 


Polish  rule,  and  establishing,  under  Bohdan  Khmelnitsky, 
a  Ukrainian  democratic  republic. 

Threatened  by  Poland  in  the  west  and  Turkey  in  the 
south,  the  young  republic  in  1654  entered  into  a  voluntary 
union  with  Russia,  which  was  looked  upon  as  a  menace, 
on  the  condition  that  the  Ukrainians  should  be  accorded 
a  full  measure  of  self-government.  The  czars,  however, 
began  curtailing  Ukraine’s  privileges,  one  after  another, 
until  the  Ukrainians  became,  after  several  unsuccessful 
uprisings,  a  subject  race.  The  partitions  of  Poland  (1772, 
1792  and  1795)  brought  under  Russia’s  domination  all 
of  the  Ukrainian  lands  except  the  westernmost  part,  the 
ancient  principality  of  Galicia,  which  was  ceeded  to 
Austria. 

4.  RECENT  HISTORY. 

Under  each  of  these  dominions  the  Ukrainians  suffered 
oppression.  Russia  wanted  to  Russify  them,  in  order  to 
get  permanent  free  access  to  the  Black  Sea.  Austria  de¬ 
livered  the  Ruthenians  of  Eastern  Galicia  into  the  hands 
of  the  Poles,  so  that  she  might  retain  the  Poles  as  a  sup¬ 
port  for  the  Hapsburg  monarchy  and  for  the  German  ele¬ 
ment  in  the  Empire.  The  Magyars  who,  in  the  fourteenth 
century,  had  conquered  the  Ukrainians  living  beyond  the 
Carpathians,  applied  to  them  the  same  policy  of  Magyar- 
ization  which  they  employed  against  all  the  other  non- 
Magyar  nationalities. 

The  crisis  created  by  the  World  War  brought  a  change 
in  the  fortunes  of  Ukraine.  The  downfall  of  the  czars 
in  the  revolution  of  March,  1917,  and  the  defeat  of  Aus¬ 
tria-Hungary  were  the  signals  for  the  resurrection  of 
Ukrainian  independence.  When  the  Provisional  Govern¬ 
ment  was  set  up  in  Russia,  the  Ukrainians  organized  an 
autonomous  government  of  their  own.  But  after  both  the 
Provisional  Government  and  the  Bolsheviki  had  shown 
themselves  unable  to  govern  except  on  the  old  central- 
istic  basis,  the  Ukrainian  Parliament  (Rada)  proclaimed, 
on  January  7,  1918,  the  independence  of  the  Ukrainian 
People’s  Republic. 

From  the  start,  the  new  republic  found  itself  in  a  criti¬ 
cal  position.  Threatened  by  Bolshevist  armies  in  the  north 
and  east  and  by  Teutonic  forces  in  the  west,  it  was  at  the 
same  time  cut  off  from  all  outside  help.  The  dilemma 
was  therefore  solved  by  making  peace  with  one  enemy, 
a  decision  similar  to  that  which  was  arrived  at  under  pre- 


15 


cisely  similar  circumstances  by  Roumania.  Thus  Ukraine,, 
invaded  by  Bolsheviki  and  hard  pressed  by  the  Central 
Powers,  made  peace  with  the  latter  at  Brest  Litovsk. 

But  the  Germans  turned  out  to  be  a  remedy  hardly  less 
deadly  than  the  disease  itself.  They  came  ostensibly  to 
drive  away  the  Bolsheviki,  but  they  behaved  no  differ¬ 
ently  from  Bolsheviki  themselves.  They  exploited  Ukraine 
economically,  by  requisitioning  bread,  cattle  and  grain 
from  the  farmers.  They  also  tried  to  rule  the  country 
politically  and,  to  this  end,  they  overthrew  the  Ukrainian 
government,  a  democratic  regime  deriving  its  powers  from 
the  will  of  the  people,  only  to  place  in  its  stead  a  military 
dictator  subservient  to  German  commands,  to  whom  was 
given  the  historic  Ukrainian  title  of  “hetman.”  This, 
individual.  General  Skoropadsky,  was  acceptable  to  the 
Teutons  because  he  was  a  militarist,  a  large  landholder,  a 
conservative,  and  a  willing  tool  in  the  German  scheme, 
which  was  to  make  Ukraine  the  centre  and  nucleus  in  a. 
reconstruction  of  the  old  centralized  Russian  empire,  every 
part  of  which  the  Germans  intended  to  control,  both  politi¬ 
cally  and  economically. 

The  result  was  foreseeable.  The  Ukrainians  rose  in  a 
mass  rebellion,  destroyed  the  German  plans  in  the  east, 
and  interfered  considerably  with  their  progress  in  the 
west.  At  a  time  when  Poland,  Roumania  and  Russia  had 
all  seceded  from  the  struggle,  against  German  expansion,, 
the  Ukrainian  insurgents  stood  in  battle  alone,  without 
material  or  moral  support  from  the  western  powers,  and 
conducted  against  the  Germans  a  sanguinary  guerrilla 
warfare  which  obliged  them  to  maintain  in  the  east  an 
army  of  a  million  soldiers,  who  were  seriously  needed  by 
their  generals  in  the  west. 

When  the  Teutonic  forces  finally  collapsed  in  the  west, 
the  Ukrainians,  led  by  an  insurgent  body  called  the 
Ukrainian  National  Union  and  composed  of  the  repre¬ 
sentatives  of  all  the  Ukrainian  parties,  drove  the  Germans 
out  of  the  country  and  organized  a  new  government,  the 
so-called  Directorate.  This  coalition  was  recognized  by 
the  National  Congress  held  at  Kiev  at  the  end  of  January, 
1919,  and  also  by  that  part  of  Ukraine  which,  un  to  the 
Teutonic  defeat,  had  remained  under  Austrian  control,  but 
immediately  after  the  Austrian  breakdown,  had  organized 
itself  into  an  independent  nation  called  the  Western 
Ukrainian  Republic. 

The  Directorate  found  itself  surrounded  by  enemies. 
Roumania  wanted  to  seize  the  former  Austrian  province 
of  Bukovina,  including  that  part  which  was  peopled  by 


16 


Ukrainians.  The  Poles  wanted  to  conquer  the  Western 
Ukrainian  provinces  of  Kholm,  Volhynia  and  Podolia, 
which  have  a  considerable  precentage  of  Poles  among  the 
landed  aristocracy  and  in  the  bureaucracy.  They  also 
wanted  to  retain  Eastern  Galicia,  where  Austrian  favor¬ 
itism  had  already  made  them  supreme.  The  Bolsheviki 
name  marching  down  from  the  north  in  order  to  intro¬ 
duce  the  soviet  form  of  rule  instead  of  the  Ukrainian  re¬ 
public  and  also  to  acquire  grain  for  Russia,  where  every¬ 
thing  was  at  sixes  and  sevens  because  of  the  communistic 
experiment.  From  the  east  came  the  Russian  centralists 
led  by  General  Denikin.  All  these  enemies  of  Ukrainian 
independence  denounced  the  self-determination  of  the 
Ukrainian  people  under  various  pretexts,  and  some  of 
them  even  gained  the  support  of  more  than  one  Allied 
power.  The  struggle  with  them  is  not  yet  over. 

5.  UKRAINIAN  NATIONAL  ASPIRATIONS. 

Since  the  downfall  of  the  ancient  Ukrainian  empire  of 
Kiev,  down  through  the  struggles  against  the  Tartars, 
Poles  and  Russians,  Ukrainian  history  displays  a  con¬ 
tinual  tradition  of  heroic  endeavors  to  re-establish  the 
political  independence  of  the  country.  This  remains  the 
ideal  of  the  Ukrainian  people  at  the  present  time. 

The  idea  of  a  possible  federation  with  Russia,  which  has 
been  advanced  by  some  Ukrainian  leaders,  has  gradually 
died  out  because  of  the  economic  exploitation,  political  dis¬ 
franchisement  and  cultural  degredation  of  the  Ukrainians 
carried  on  by  the  czarist  regime.  The  centralist  policies 
were  seen  to  survive  even  under  the  liberals,  Lvov  and 
Kerensky,  and  were  actively  revived  by  such  men  as 
Skoropadsky,  Kolchak  and  Denikin,  and  by  the  poorly 
masked  Russian  nationalism  of  the  Bolsheviki.  The  ques¬ 
tion  of  economic  relations  between  Ukraine  and  Russia 
must  be  settled,  in  the  opinion  of  the  Ukrainian  people, 
as  an  international  question  between  two  independent 
nations. 

The  same  may  be  said  of  the  federations  suggested  for 
Ukraine  with  some  of  her  other  neighbors.  Ukraine  does 
not  want  such  federations.  She  wants  independence.  As 
to  the  various  racial  minorities  living  in  Ukraine,  succes¬ 
sive  national  assemblies  have  repeatedly  declared  them¬ 
selves  unreservedly  in  favor  of  granting  these  minorities 
the  right  of  proportional  suffrage,  national-personal  auto¬ 
nomy,  and  the  right  of  representation  in  all  departments 
of  the  government. 


17 


IV.  INDUSTRY 

1.  AGRICULTURE. 

Agriculture  has  always  been  the  chief  industry  of 
Ukraine.  About  85%  of  the  population  are  employed  in 
it.  Indeed,  Ukraine  has  been  called  “the  granary  of 
Europe.”  The  principal  agricultural  product  is  wheat, 
the  average  annual  yield  of  which  amounted  in  pre-war 
days  to  7,716,000  short  tons.  The  average  yearly  yield 
of  rye  was  4,630,000  tons,  and  that  of  barley  5,512,000 
tons.  Of  relatively  smaller  importance  are  other  products  : 
potatoes  (over  11,023,000  tons),  oats  (about  3,638,000 
tons),  maize  (over  550,000  tons)  and  millet  (over  550,000 
tons).  The  cultivation  of  hemp,  flax,  sunflower  and  poppy 
has  never  reached  its  full  capacity  of  development,  but 
sugar-beets  are  grown  in  great  quantities,  the  total  annual 
pre-war  yield  being  about  5,500,000  tons.  The  annual  pro¬ 
duction  of  tobacco  amounted  in  1908  to  over  77,000  tons, 
that  of  hops  to  about  33,000  tons.  Vegetables  are  not 
raised  as  extensively  as  they  could  be,  although  south¬ 
ern  Ukraine  possesses  big  plantations  of  watermelons, 
pumpkins  and  cucumbers.  Fruit-culture  is  better  devel¬ 
oped.  Bee-culture  is  very  popular.  Live  stock  raising 
is  an  industry  of  the  greatest  importance,  especially  the 
raising  of  hoof-cattle  and  hogs. 

Improvement  of  agricultural  methods  was  attended  with 
great  difficulties  during  the  reign  of  the  czars.  Among 
the  causes  of  the  backward  state  of  Ukrainian  agriculture 
were  the  extent  of  the  great  landed  estates  centered  in 
the  hands  of  the  inefficient  nobilitv,  the  scantiness  of  the 
land  in  the  hands  of  the  peasantry,  and  the  scarcity  of 
working  capital,  due  to  excessive  taxation  and  a  corrupt 
bureaucracy.  In  order  to  reconstruct  Ukrainian  agricul¬ 
ture,  the  farmer  will  need  capital  for  various  purposes 
of  amelioration,  such  as  the  purchase  of  labor-saving  ma¬ 
chinery  and  the  replacing  of  his  herds  of  live  stock,  many 
of  which  were  virtually  exterminated  during  the  war. 

2.  MINING. 

The  chief  Ukrainian  mining  districts  are  the  basin  of  the 
Donetz,  the  slopes  of  the  Carpathians,  the  regions  of  Terek 
and  Kuban,  and  the  Caucasus. 

Iron  ores  are  found  in  great  quantities  all  over  Ukraine, 
the  most  important  centers  of  iron  production  being  in  the 


18 


province  of  Kherson,  in  the  Donetz  basin,  in  the  Caucasus, 
and  in  Volhynia.  In  1911,  the  iron  output  of  Ukraine 
amounted  to  over  5,500,000  tons. 

Ukraine  possesses  rich  deposits  of  manganese,  in  the 
district  of  Nicopol,  on  the  Dnieper,  and  in  Eastern  Podolia. 
In  the  Donetz  basin  there  are  important  mercury  mines. 

The  coal  fields  of  the  Donetz  basin  are  among  the  richest 
in  Europe.  In  1911  they  produced  nearly  3,300,000  tons 
of  anthracite  and  3,610,000  tons  of  coke.  In  spite  of  this 
large  showing,  the  Ukrainian  coal  industry  is  still  in  its 
infancy. 

Ukrainian  Galicia  possess  rich  pockets  of  petroleum  and 
deposits  of  ozokerite,  or  natural  paraffin.  Galicia’s  total 
yield  of  oil  in  1911  amounted  to  almost  1,948,000  tons,  an 
output  exceeded  only  by  that  of  the  United  States  and 
of  the  Caucasus.  Ozokerite  is  found  in  Eastern  Galicia 
and  in  the  Ukrainian  sub-Caucasian  districts,  the  former 
containing  the  richest  deposits  of  that  mineral  in  the 
world. 

Ukraine’s  total  salt  production  in  1907  amounted  to 
1,100,000  tons.  She  possesses  excellent  pottery  clays,  rich 
deposits  of  kaolin,  graphite,  chalk,  sulphur  and  a  good  deal 
of  peat.  The  want  of  capital  and  unfavorable  political 
conditions  have  prevented  a  full  exploitation  of  these  very 
great  natural  resources. 

3.  MANUFACTURING. 

Ukraine’s  industry  is  now  in  a  transitional  stage,  from 
the  status  of  home-industry  to  that  of  large  scale  factory 
production. 

Ukrainian  home-industry  is  distinguished  by  the  dura¬ 
bility,  solidity  and  especially  the  clever  ornamentation  of 
its  products.  Cooperage,  wagon-making,  ship-building, 
basket-weaving,  pottery,  metal-working,  rope-making  and 
tanning  are  pursued  in  this  fashion. 

Factory  organization  is  of  recent  introduction  in 
Ukraine,  but  its  progress  before  the  war  had  been  encour¬ 
aging.  The  most  important  factories  were  the  sugar 
establishments,  which  produced  in  1914  over  1,500,000  tons 
or  raw  sugar  and  about  1,000,000  tons  of  refined  sugar. 
Next  in  significance  are  flour-milling,  liquor  distillation, 
oil-pressing,  tobacco  products,  match  industry,  and  paper¬ 
making.  Although  the  Russian  government  tried  artifi¬ 
cially  to  protect  the  Moscow  district  in  its  competition 
with  Ukraine,  nevertheless  the  Ukrainian  cast-iron  in- 


19 


dustry  reached,  in  1917,  the  mark  of  3,000,000  tons  yearly. 
Like  the  mines,  the  manufacturing  industries  of  Ukraine 
need  for  their  development  free  political  institutions  and  a 
supply  of  capital. 

4.  TRANSPORTATION. 

Communication  in  Ukraine  is  poorly  provided  for.  This 
has  been  partly  due  to  unfavorable  natural  conditions, 
but  chiefly  to  the  inefficiency  of  the  government  officials. 
Particularly  was  this  the  case  of  the  roads,  the  construc¬ 
tion  of  which  was  perenially  neglected  by  both  Poles  and 
Russians. 

The  Ukrainian  railroads  are  inadequately  developed. 
Galicia’s  mileage  amounts  to  5  miles  for  every  100  square 
miles.  That  of  the  rest  of  Ukraine  amounts  to  only  1  mile 
for  a  similar  area.  The  railroads  were  built  with  strategic 
objects  in  view.  If  ever  economic  interests  were  taken 
into  consideration,  they  were  the  economic  interests  of 
the  foreign  centers:  in  Austria,  those  of  Vienna  and  the 
Germans;  in  Russia,  those  of  Moscow,  Petrograd  and  the 
Baltic  ports.  The  chief  railroad  center  in  Galicia  is  Lem¬ 
berg  (Lviv).  Outside  of  Galicia,  the  chief  junctions  are 
at  Brest  and  Kharkov. 

The  chief  waterways  are  the  rivers  Dnieper,  Don,  Bug, 
Dniester  and  Kuban.  The  Dnieper  is  navigable  through¬ 
out  its  entire  course  within  Ukraine  except  for  a  stretch 
below  the  city  of  Katerinoslav,  where  it  is  made  useless 
because  of  rapids.  Ukraine  possesses  very  few  artificial 
waterways. 

5.  INTERNAL  COMMERCE. 

The  trade  between  different  portions  of  Ukraine  is  com¬ 
paratively  insignificant.  There  is  in  Ukraine  no  large  com¬ 
mercial  class,  and  that  which  existed  was  composed  largely 
of  Russians,  Germans  or  other  foreigners,  who  used  their 
influence  with  the  bureaucracy  to  freeze  out  all  Ukrainians. 
At  the  same  time,  the  co-operative  societies  have  had  a 
great  growth.  Eastern  Galicia  was  covered  with  a  net¬ 
work  of  co-operative  organizations,  and  the  co-operatives 
in  the  Russian  part  of  Ukraine  amounted  to  47%  of  those 
of  the  entire  Russian  empire.  The  significance  of  the  co¬ 
operative  movement  was  enhanced  by  conditions  which 
came  into  being  during  and  after  the  war. 

A  characteristic  feature  of  Ukrainian  internal  commerce 
has  been  the  importance  of  the  annual  fair.  These  fairs 


20 


have  been  held  at  many  of  the  most  important  cities; 
e.  g.,  Kiev,  Kharkov,  Romny  and  Poltava. 

6.  INTERNATIONAL  COMMERCE. 

International  trade  relations  are  even  less  developed 
than  internal  commerce.  It  can  be  safely  said  that  so 
far  Ukraine  has  supplied  for  export  only  raw  materials 
and  received  manufactured  goods  in  exchange.  She  ex¬ 
ported  grain,  live  stock,  poultry,  eggs,  butter,  sugar,  lum¬ 
ber,  oil,  iron  ore,  manganese,  salt,  coal,  hemp  and  flax, 
and  imported  all  kinds  of  metal  goods,  especially  agri¬ 
cultural  machinery  and  manufactured  tools.  She  also 
bought  cotton  and  woolen  goods  abroad. 

The  future  will  see  a  considerable  development  in 
Ukraine’s  commerce  with  the  world.  Until  now  the  back¬ 
wardness  of  the  land’s  industrial  development,  a  series 
of  political  oppressions  and  economic  exploitations  have 
prevented  Ukraine  from  occupying  that  position  in  world 
trade  which  she  ought  to  enjoy  because  of  her  immense 
natural  resources,  her  position  in  the  proximity  of  Asia 
and  the  Mediterranean  Sea,  and  the  industrious  quality 
of  the  Ukrainian  people. 


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